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Sinha, Gupta, Kutnar: Sustainable Development and Green Buildings

Arijit Sinha1, Rakesh Gupta1, Andreja Kutnar2

Sustainable Development
and Green Buildings
Odrivi razvoj i zelena gradnja
Review paper Pregledni rad
Received prispjelo: 17. 2. 2012.
Accepted prihvaeno: 15. 11. 2012.
UDK: 630*833.1
doi:10.5552/drind.2013.1205
ABSTRACT Global sustainability goals have led to the development of the green building movement. The Green
Building Program, stemming from the movement, has had unprecedented success as it provides a quantiable
metric to peoples efforts towards sustainable development. Sustainable development and green buildings are often
used interchangeably. Although, sustainable development and green buildings are related, they are not the same.
This paper provides an overview of how green building relates to sustainable development practices. Sustainability also governs decisions concerning building materials. A comprehensive explanation of what constitutes a green
building material is discussed and how renewable material like wood fare in the deciding criteria. There are many
green building rating systems in place. United States Green Building Council administered Leadership in Energy
and Environment Design (LEED) is the global market leader in the rating systems. LEED is a commendable and
grand effort in moving towards sustainable development by converting the built environment green. However, it
does have certain pitfalls and challenges. Some of these challenges are with respect to policies on material selection and performance monitoring. The materials used in a project are considered at a common starting point
and no consideration is given to the life cycle performance of the material. Statements concerning sustainability
require validation, and Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) is a tool that can provide such validity. This paper presents how
benecial it can be, when included, in the bigger scheme of green building rating systems and introduces an integrated design concept for green buildings.
Key words: LEED, life cycle analysis, wood
SAETAK Ciljevi odrivosti drutva i graana svijeta doveli su do razvoja pokreta zelene gradnje. Programi
zelene gradnje, koji proizlaze iz pokreta, imali su nevien uspjeh jer su osiguravali mjerljive veliine za uspjenost u
naporima za odrivi razvoj. Odrivi razvoj i zelena gradnja esto se upotrebljavaju u istom znaenju. Iako su odrivi
razvoj i zelena gradnja povezani, oni nisu isto. U ovom je radu dan pregled kako se zelena gradnja odnosi prema
praksi odrivog razvoja. Odrivost takoer utjee na odluke koje se odnose na materijal za gradnju. U radu se daje
opseno objanjenje to je to zeleni graevni materijal se te navodi kako je obnovljivi materijal poput drva esto
meu odluujuim kriterijima pri gradnji. Postoje mnogi rejting sustavi zelene gradnje. Savjet za zelenu gradnju
SAD-a upravljao je skupinom Vodstvo u energetici i zatiti okolia (LEED), koja je globalni trini lider u rejting
sustavima. LEED skupina simbolizira vrlo pohvalan i velik trud u kretanju prema odrivom razvoju pretvaranjem
izgraenog okolia u zeleno. No tu su i neke zamke i izazovi. Neki od tih izazova odnose se na pravila odabira materijala i praenje uinaka gradnje. Materijali koji se koriste u projektu razmatrani su s obzirom na zajedniko polazite,
no nije razmatran i njihov ivotni ciklus. Izjave o odrivosti zahtijevaju dokaz valjanosti, a analiza ivotnog ciklusa
(LCA) alat je koji moe dati takav dokaz. Rad pokazuje kako ukljuivanje takve analize u veim shemama rejting
sustava zelene gradnje moe biti korisno, kao i uvoenje integriranog koncepta dizajna zelenih zgrada.
Kljune rijei: LEED, analiza ivotnog ciklusa, drvo
1

Authors are assistant professor and professor at Department of Wood Science and Engineering, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon,
USA. 2Author is research associate at Andrej Marui Institute, University of Primorska, Koper and at ILTRA d.o.o., Ljubljana, Slovenia.
Autori su docent i profesor Odjela znanosti o drvu i inenjerstva Sveuilita u Oregonu, Corvallis, Oregon, SAD. 2Autorica je znanstvenica
Instituta Andrej Marui, Sveuilite Primorska, Koper, i ILTRA d.o.o., Ljubljana, Slovenija.

DRVNA INDUSTRIJA 64 (1) 45-53 (2013)

45

Sinha, Gupta, Kutnar: Sustainable Development and Green Buildings

1 INTRODUCTION
1. UVOD
Climate change and its disastrous consequences
are stimulating the transformation towards a sustainable development, with its increasing economic efciency, protection and restoration of ecological systems
and improvement of human well-being. The maintenance of natural resources is a subject that often appears when sustainable development is considered. In
addition, with increasing world population and economic development of various nations, the strain on
resources is increasing. As economic development and
environment are linked, the realization has set in to
conserve energy and resources. Globally, infrastructure
and building construction consumes 60 % of the raw
materials extracted from the Earth (Bribian et al., 2011,
MMSD, 2002). From this volume, building accounts
for 40 %, in other words 24 % of these global extractions. In the US, with 4 % of worlds population, the
consumption of resources is at a staggering 25 % of
total resources available in the world (Teller and Bergman 2010). A majority of these resources (60 % according to USGBC) are consumed in the building industry. In Europe, the per capita mineral extractions for
buildings are approximately 4.8 tons per year (Wadel,
2009) Consumption of non-renewable and non-replenishable minerals will be detrimental to the environment
and will have catastrophic effect on humans. In addition to that, energy consumption during and in use of
building is enormous. In the US, the built environment
accounts for 65 % of all energy consumption (USGBC
2010). In the European Union (EU) the corresponding
number is 42 % (Nelson 2002). In addition, carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from the built environment accounts for roughly 35-40 % of total emissions, both in
the US as well as in the EU (Environmental Information Administration 2008, Nelson 2002). Not only do
buildings consist of a multitude of products, and therefore technical and biological nutrients, they also have
an important and wide-ranging impact on water and
energy cycles, air quality (indoor and outdoor), and
fauna and ora, as well as on social and economic factors. The increased use of resources that cause pollution and emissions, highlight the need to save and conserve energy for sustainable development.
In engineering, sustainable design is a design ideology, which harbors the notion of sustainable human
and societal development. Sustainable development can
be dened in various ways. Every individual will approach the issue of sustainability in a different manner
depending upon various factors, such as, sustainability
goals, background, awareness, and economic conditions. Sustainability is providing opportunity of development to the future generation, in terms of resources.
One of the key aspects in sustainability is sustainable
construction. Sustainable construction practices are such
that they are based on ecological principles, with no environmental impacts, have a closed material loop, and
have full integration into the landscape after the service
life of the structure is over. The concept of green build46

..................

ings is the measure of our efforts in attaining that idealistic sustainable construction practices. According to
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the US,
Green Building is the practice of creating structures
and using processes that are environmentally responsible and resource-efcient throughout a building life-cycle from siting to design, construction, operation, maintenance, renovation, and deconstruction. This denition
has evolved over the years. Green Buildings is an ever
evolving, dynamic term. Green Building is the status of
our efforts in attaining sustainability in construction
practices. As technology evolves and new materials are
developed, the status of our efforts are also changing.
Hence, the essence of green buildings is changing. The
aim of this paper is to discuss sustainability with respect
to green buildings, its importance in one of the worlds
leading Green Building program - Leadership in Energy
and Environmental Design (LEED) certication from
the perspective of sustainable material selection, and
governing policies in LEED. Furthermore, the role of
life cycle assessment (LCA) in assessing the sustainability claims of green buildings and building materials is
introduced. Moreover, the potential for including LCA
in the scheme of Green Building rating system is critically evaluated.
2 SUSTAINABILITY WITH RESPECT TO
BUILDING MATERIALS
2. ODRIVOST S OBZIROM NA MATERIJALE
ZA GRADNJU
Sustainability is increasingly becoming a key
consideration of building practitioners with the goal of
increasing economic efciency, protecting, and restoring ecological systems and improving human well-being. To achieve sustainability, the following objectives
should be met:
1. Minimize consumption of matter and energy;
2. Reusability and recyclability of the material;
3. Human satisfaction;
4. Minimum environmental impacts and embodied energy.
It is important to minimize the consumption, as
while a material is consumed, its chances for future use
are diminishing; hence, its potential utility to future
generation is lost (Roberts, 1994). Another aspect of
minimizing the consumption is either reusing the same
material or recycling the material to mold into a different or similar building product. This also ties into the
third criteria i.e., meeting a certain level of end-user
satisfaction (Pearce at al., 1995). Trade-offs are inevitable when deciding on a material, and mostly are between resource consumption and human satisfaction.
Human satisfaction level also changes with time and is
correlated to various external factors, such as, costs,
ensuring human comfort, safety and enriching the human spirit (Day, 1990). Human satisfaction level is
also driven by the sustainability goal that in turn dictates the material selection process. Addressing the
need of human satisfaction is very important. Another
important aspect of material selection is its environ-

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.................. Sinha, Gupta, Kutnar: Sustainable Development and Green Buildings

mental costs and energy associated at various steps of
its manufacturing process. However, to dene a green
material, numerous factors have to be considered.

Design
oblikovanje

DRVNA INDUSTRIJA 64 (1) 45-53 (2013)

Transportation
transport

Development
razvoj

2.1 Evaluation of building materials on

greenness
2.1. Ocjena materijala za gradnju kao zelenoga

The most general criteria for evaluating building

materials are resource management, pollution or indoor environmental quality (IEQ), and performance
(Milani, 2005; Spiegel and Meadows, 2006). The resources used by a material include all the components
and energy used to extract, process, transport, use, and
dispose/ recycle it. The energy used to produce it or
process it to usable form, known as embodied (or embedded) energy can be particularly large for building
materials. Pollution includes all the emissions of the
mines and factories used to produce the material, as
well as the emissions of use formaldehyde and emissions from products used to clean and maintain the material along with the pollution resulting from its nal
incineration or land-lling (Milani, 2005). Performance refers to how well the material does its intended
job. Materials with low durability, no matter how benignly produced, can hardly qualify as green. Durability is dened as the ability of a building or any of its
components to perform the required functions in a
service environment over a period of time without unforeseen cost for maintenance or repair. Wood is durable material, which has to be accompanied with appropriate building applications and design. The natural
durability of wood has been proven by the multitude of
buildings that have stood for centuries. While wood
natural bio-based attributes make it a sustainable building material, it also makes wood vulnerable to decay
and wood destroying insects. Proper design, installation and detailing are critical to ensure long-term durability. When wood is used in exposed applications, or
in areas where it is subjected to moisture and insects, it
must be protected with mechanical barriers, coatings
and, in some instances, preservative treatments. For
materials like insulation, performance goes beyond durability, since good thermal performance, for example,
can actively save resources and energy.
These three evaluation categories, resources, performance, and pollution overlap considerably. Consider a sheathing material, for example the performance
of that material, will inuence the resources and energy
they use in operation. Construction materials live much
longer than most other materials (Milani, 2005; Wadel,
2009). Approximately, 60 % of the materials extracted
out of earths crust end up in the built environment
(Wadel, 2009; Bribian et al., 2011) and they have a life
cycle, mostly related to the time when the building is in
operation. This tends to make durability and performance somewhat more important than for many other
kinds of products. Figure 1, compiled from inputs from
Malin (1999, 2002), Milani (2005) and Spiegel and
Meadows (2006), presents various phases of material,
which are the base of evaluations. Greenness of a
material is evaluated on four distinct levels:

Manufacturing
proizvodnja

Planning
planiranje

Phase
faza

Deconstruction
razgradnja

Construction
gradnja

Maintenance
RGUDYDQMH
Modification
promjena

Figure 1 Various phases of a material life cycle

Slika 1. Faze ivotnog ciklusa materijala

Raw-Material Phase (resource limitation, resource

extraction, transportation);
Manufacturing Level (waste reduction, pollution
prevention, recycled content, embodied energy reduction, use of natural materials);
Operation level (reduction in construction waste, energy efciency, longer life/ durability, occupant health,
water treatment/conservation, use of non-toxic or lesstoxic materials, renewable energy systems);
Disposal (reusability, recyclability, biodegradability).

3 GREEN BUILDING RATING SYSTEMS

3. REJTING SUSTAVI ZELENE GRADNJE
The green building movement addresses a broad
array of areas such as energy efciency, water management, material production, construction issues, occupant
health quality, air quality management, recycling, reusability, and waste management (Bowyer, 2008). This
vast array of its coverage could be one of the reasons for
its unprecedented success. Currently there are more than
40 green building programs in the US. In the residential
sector, many independent organizations led an initiative
in their local jurisdiction and municipalities across the
US. Some examples of these are the green building
movement in Denver, Colorado; Kitsap County and
King County, Washington; the Baltimore suburban
builders association; the Earth craft houses program in
Atlanta; Austin Green builder program, and Wisconsin
green built program. The National Association of Homebuilders (NAHB) was proactive and took note of these
increasing initiatives towards green construction, and as
a result issued guidance available to its 800 state and local associations, educating and informing them how to
create their own green building program. Encouraged by
its enormous success and a need for standardization,
NAHB designed its own green building program in
2008, called the National Green Building Program
(NAHB 2010). Since its inception, it has emerged to be
the market leader in the residential sector. However, in
the commercial arena, the market leader is the US Green
Building Council (USGBC) administered program
called the Leadership in Energy and Environmental De47

Sinha, Gupta, Kutnar: Sustainable Development and Green Buildings

sign (LEED) followed by Green Globes. Since foundation of the NAHB rating system, LEED has also diversied itself in an effort to enter the residential sector. To
earn certication under the LEED program, a building
must meet certain prerequisites and performance benchmarks within each category.
The World Green Building Council recognizes
25 countries in Europe that have green building councils. With its strong focus on zero net resource consumption and passive solutions, Europe is widely recognized as a global leader in minimizing the use of
resources and energy. The United Kingdom was the
rst country to develop a major green building rating
system called the Building Research Establishment
Environmental Assessment (BREEAM). Germany and
France have their own green building rating systems.
In Eastern Europe, LEED is also gaining popularity
(Sinha and Kutnar, 2012).
3.1 LEED rating system
3.1. Rejting sustav LEED

The LEED rating system is administered by

United States Green Building Council (USGBC).
LEED is a voluntary rating system to ensure a superior
environmental performance of a building over its life
time. LEED was developed to evaluate the performance of construction and design from a standpoint of
sustainability in 1998 for commercial constructions.
Since its inception, LEED has evolved and improved
through several revisions. LEED 2009 is the current
version, while discussions are currently underway for
LEED 2012. LEED 2009 contains the following specic rating systems: 1) New Construction (NC); 2) Existing Buildings: Operations and Maintenance; 3)
Commercial Interiors; 4) Core and Shell; 5) Retail; 6)
Healthcare; 7) Homes; and 8) Neighborhood Development. Each of the rating systems is composed of 100
points, which are divided among ve categories: Sustainable Sites (26); Water Efciency (10); Energy and
Atmosphere (35); Materials and Resources (14); and
Indoor Environmental Quality (15). Additionally, up to
10 bonus points are possible through innovative design
and consideration of regional priorities. Each category
in LEED 2009 has certain prerequisites that are mandatory for all projects and are not eligible for points. The
points are then distributed across major categories and
are assigned in a progressive way for incremental level
of documented efforts to increase environmental performance. The LEED system rates buildings at four
levels - certied, silver, gold, and platinum, with the
following credit requirements:
- Certied - 40 - 49 points
- Silver - 50 - 59 points
- Gold - 60 - 79 points
- Platinum - 80 points and above
Currently, the LEED rating system is a nationally
accepted benchmark for design, construction and operation of high-performance green buildings and is used to
evaluate a signicant portion of new construction within
the United States. In the commercial arena in the United
States, LEED is the market leader, with 90 % of all certi48

..................

ed buildings being LEED certied. It can be argued

that the LEED system is also a global leader in green
building. The LEED International Roundtable is composed of representatives from 21 countries who work to
provide global consistency in regional approaches to
green building. Each of these 21 countries utilizes LEED
rating systems that are catered to the local conditions in
their country. Additionally, LEED has registered projects
in 133 countries. The percentage of new construction
projects evaluated by LEED (for New Construction) has
markedly increased throughout the last decade, as various stakeholders recognize the need to validate their
achievements for sustainable construction. The green
building concept and sustainable design are growing
phenomenon in engineering, which has an unprecedented growth rate and acceptability. In 2006, studies showed
that about 20 % of the designers have been involved in
projects that have resulted in LEED certication as opposed to only 10 % in 2003 (BDC, 2011). It is projected
that by the end of 2013, 94 % of the current architectural
and engineering rms would be extensively working on
green projects (Bernstein and Bowerbank, 2008). In the
future, it is speculated that green building rating systems
will move towards performance-based systems and have
a performance monitoring protocol in place. The fact
that the energy supply and resources are diminishing;
coupled with the increased awareness in people to contribute towards sustainability is helping drive this rapid
growth in green buildings. People like to see their efforts
validated by an agency and USGBC through LEED is
providing that. Furthermore, despite dominance of
Buildings Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Methodology (BREEAM) in the European
green building performance market, LEED is gaining
some traction. Various projects all over Europe are
adopting LEED measures. Several buildings have been
already LEED certied in Italy, England, Poland, the
Czech Republic, Bulgaria, and Portugal.
3.2 Questionable ratings in LEED
3.2. Dvojbeni rejtinzi u LEED-u
3.2.1 LEED Materials
3.2.1. LEED materijali

The USGBC, although a grand and comprehensive effort towards sustainable design, has certain pitfalls in terms of how it rates the materials. There are
provisions in LEED and other primary green building
programs, which could result in signicant negative impact on wood and wood products as a building material
(Bowyer, 2008). The LEED rating system rates the material at the same level while being used in the building.
All materials are considered at an equal footing and their
life history does not have an impact on the rating credits.
Materials like, concrete and wood are considered equal.
However, life cycle analysis have shown that wood has
less embodied energy than concrete or steel because it is
a biological renewable material (Puettman et al., 2005),
while the raw materials to make cement and then concrete is a product of energy intensive mining (PCA,
2002; van Oss and Padovani, 2002; Rajendran and Gambatese, 2007). Steel is preferred over wood and concrete,
because of its recyclability and recycled content (USG-

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.................. Sinha, Gupta, Kutnar: Sustainable Development and Green Buildings

BC, 2009). Steel, although it is recyclable, has higher
environmental impacts than wood because the raw material has to be mined and then steel has to be extracted
in a furnace (IISI, 2000). Many experts (Bowyer, 2008)
consider this viewpoint, by which more importance is
given to steel, as a serious error from an environmental
standpoint.
LEED assigns extra credit for materials that are
rapidly renewable (LEED-NC, 2009). The criterion
of rapid renewability with respect to wood is 10-year
turn around period. For trees with a smaller rotation
time of 10 years or less, those credits can be attained.
However, for longer rotation crops valuable credits
cannot be obtained. Wood is a renewable material, with
some trees having a smaller rotation cycle and some
trees having a higher rotation period. Bamboo, for e.g.,
is a rapidly growing tree as compared to maple and
hence, so bamboo ooring is preferred over maple
ooring in LEED. The scientic background of this
preference has been heavily challenged (Bowyer, 2007)
and there is ongoing debate as to whether to change the
category of rapidly renewable to renewable (YPFPG, 2008). This will give wood as a building material
clear advantage as it is a renewable material. Besides,
wood is causing less emissions of CO2 and generates
less waste compared to the alternative materials (Petersen and Solberg, 2005).
A challenge that LEED faces is to ensure that the
wood coming into the project has been grown and harvested in a sustainable manner. Forest Certication ensures this. Forest Certication has a two-fold objective
in the LEED program. It provides evidence that the
wood has been grown and harvested in environmentally and socially responsible manner, and determines
whether wood might qualify for credits as a renewable material. It will also ensure that wood harvested
illegally (outside the US) will not receive any credits.
There are many forest certication schemes prevalent
in the US. Currently, Forest Stewardship Council (FSC)
is the only one recognized by the USGBC (LEED-NC,
2009). Alternative programs, although similar in their
efforts to promote responsible forest management, are
not recognized. With FSC wood being limited, it is difcult to earn credits for certied wood. Moreover, it is
only wood that requires external validation or certication, while other materials in LEED do not (LEED,
2009), despite social and environmental impacts associated with other materials (Bowyer, 2007, 2008).
3.2.2 LEED Performance
3.2.2. LEED izvedba

Besides its ambiguity in rating materials, the performance of the LEED program has also been challenged
(Torcellini, 2004; Bowyer, 2008; Bribian et al., 2011).
The LEED program is a not performance based rating
system. Rather, it is a checklist of provision, which is
supposed to ensure performance. There are no provisions
for performance monitoring in LEED. As a result, a question is often posed Does the LEED program help in
reducing energy consumption and improve energy performance of building? The LEED program has been

DRVNA INDUSTRIJA 64 (1) 45-53 (2013)

around long enough to assess the changes. Various studies have tried to answer this. Torcellini et al. (2004) conducted an overview of six sustainable buildings in the
USA to compare the results to predicted energy savings.
Analysis showed that all buildings performed worse than
predicted, but all managed a substantial saving compared
to a comparable code-compliant building. The deviation
from the predicted savings was due to higher than expected occupant loads and systems not performing together as designed. Turner (2006) compared 11 buildings
in the Cascadia Region, USA and found all buildings performed better than their baseline. In other words, buildings performed better than their non-green code-compliant counterparts. Fowler and Rauch (2008) investigated
12 Federal Buildings, all designed with energy conservation approach and found that they saved 25-30 % more
energy that similar US commercial buildings. Baylon
and Storm (2008) examined the characteristics of LEED
commercial buildings in the US Pacic Northwest, and
compared them to regional non-LEED buildings. The
mean energy use per oor area for the 12 LEED buildings was 10 % lower than the 39 similar non-LEED
buildings in the same region.
Diamond et al. (2006) investigated 21 LEEDcertied (LEED-NC Version 2.0/2.1) buildings using the
modeled energy data for the as-designed and baseline
building as submitted to the USGBC. On average, for
the 18 buildings that had both simulated whole building
design and actual energy use data, energy use was 1 %
lower than modeling predictions (which were 27 % below baseline). However, there was large variability
(standard deviation, s.d. 46 %), and some performed better than predicted, while others performed worse. Further, the number of LEED energy credits obtained in the
certication did not correlate with the actual energy use
per oor area. Newsham et al. (2009) reported similar
results. The authors studied 100 LEED certied buildings, compared the results to commercial US buildings,
and reported that LEED buildings used 1839 % less
energy per oor area than their conventional counterparts, conrmed by statistical analysis. However, 2835
% of LEED buildings used more energy than their conventional counterparts. Similar to Diamond et al. (2006),
Newsham et al. (2009) did not nd any correlation between the certication level (Silver, Gold, Platinum) and
the measured energy performance. Therefore, they recommended that although green buildings contribute to
signicant energy savings, more work is needed to dene the scope of the rating systems and design a plan to
be consistent at a generic level as well as at the individual building level.
4 LIFE CYCLE ASSESSMENT (LCA)
POTENTIAL GREEN BUILDING RATING
SYSTEM
4. OCJENA IVOTNOG CIKLUSA (LCA)
POTENCIJALNI REJTING SUSTAV ZELENE
GRADNJE
Life-cycle assessment (LCA) is a rational, quantied approach to determining specic environmental impacts of a product or system through its entire life cycle.
49

Sinha, Gupta, Kutnar: Sustainable Development and Green Buildings

As solutions are sought to reduce the impacts of buildings, LCA is seen as an objective measure for comparing
building designs. LCA clearly has an important role to
play in assessing the sustainability of green buildings
and it is a valuable tool in decision-making.
Studies found LCA to have started in 1960s (Hunt
et al., 1992), however, it gain prominence in the 1990s
(Bribian et al., 2009). From the time, when LCA analysis was developed till today, numerous methodologies to
classify, characterize, and normalize environmental effects have been developed. The most common, for example CML 2 (2000), IPCC Greenhouse gas emissions,
Ecopoints 97 and Eco-indicator 99 (PR Consultants,
2010), are focused on the following indicators: acidication, eutrophication, thinning the ozone layer, various
types of ecotoxicity, air contaminations, usage of resources and greenhouse gas emissions. At rst, LCA
analysis was mostly focused on environmental effects
like acidication and eutrophication, while more recently mostly on greenhouse gas emissions, which are also
called carbon footprint. The carbon footprint is expressed in terms of the amount of emitted carbon dioxide or its equivalent of other greenhouse gases. In Europe, carbon footprint is gaining its importance and it
can be expected that it will become necessary information accompanying products and services.
The LCA methodology involves four steps (Environmental, 1997; ISO 14040, 2006; Puettmann et al.,
2010). The goal and scope denition step spells out the
purpose of the study and its breadth and depth. The second step, Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) quanties the environmental inputs and outputs associated with a product
over its entire life cycle. Inventory analysis entails quantifying the inventory ows for a product system. Inventory ows include inputs of water, energy, and raw materials, and releases to air, land, and water. However,
these inputs and outputs are not of great interest (Lippiatt, 1998). More important are their consequences, or
impacts on the environment. Thus, the next LCA step,
impact assessment (LCIA), characterizes these inventory ows in relation to a set of environmental impacts as
identied in LCI. Finally, the interpretation step combines environmental impact in accordance with the goals
of the study (Environmental, 1997).
For a product, the life cycle starts with procuring
the raw material, primary processing, secondary
processing or manufacturing, packaging, shipping and
handling, installation, in-use energy consumption,
maintenance, and end-of-life strategies. Figure 2 shows
the various stages of a product lifecycle and system
boundaries. LCA is performed at various stages (Figure 2). For example, Cradle-to-Gate refers to life cycle
assessment from raw material stage to the point it is
shipped out to the eld. Similarly, cradle-to-grave involves LCA of all stages of the product or the material,
starting from raw material procurement to end-of-life
strategies. For buildings, the life cycle generally starts
with extraction of raw resources from the natural environment or recovery of materials from a previous use.
The raw resources are then manufactured into useable
products, such as steel, concrete, etc. The nished
50

..................

Input materials + transport

ulazni materijali + transport

Manufacturing
proizvodnja

Building
gradnja

Use phase of a building

XSRUDEDJUDHYLQH

Decomposition, recycling
razgradnja, recikliranje

Figure 2 Simplied presentation of LCA variants, system

boundaries
Slika 2. Pojednostavnjena prezentacija varijanti LCA,
granice sustava

products are then shipped to the site consuming energy

in the process. On the site, the products are assembled
into a building. During the service life of the building,
it consumes energy. In due course of time renovation or
retrot is performed on the building, which uses materials and energy. Finally, the building is removed/demolished and its materials disposed of either as construction waste or recycled for reuse. Each of these
steps consumes energy and materials and produces
waste. The purpose of the LCA quanties how a building product or system affects the environment during
each phase of its life. Examples of parameters that may
be quantied include: energy consumption, resource
use, greenhouse gas production, solid waste generation, and pollution generation.
The adoption of life-cycle approach to design,
where not only current energy concerns are accounted
for, but also long-term energy, environmental, and social impacts, should lead to an integrated approach to
design. A building uses most of its energy during its
service life, which is about 90 % of the total life cycle
energy (Citherlet and Defaux, 2007; Newsham et al.,
2009). This is the stage where a structural engineer has
least impact. However, as building energy use has become more efcient, the role of structural engineer has
become more and more important. A structural engineer has primary input during the design, construction
and end-of-life stages, where a signicant energy reduction can result in buildings with less environmental
impacts. A structural engineer, if involved in planning,
can have signicant impact in all aspects of the building life-cycle. Structural engineers must be forthright,
educate themselves in LCA and sustainability so that
they can be decision-makers, and be able to make their
contribution to reducing the projects environmental
impact (Webster, 2005).
As the inuence of green building programs continues to increase and the eld matures, the primary
green building programs will shift to use of LCA as a

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.................. Sinha, Gupta, Kutnar: Sustainable Development and Green Buildings

means of using science and consistent methodology to
inform green building decisions (Bowyer, 2008) and
move towards an integrated design process, since the
design of a building is a complex process involving
multitudes of disciplines and expertise. However,
transparent and standardized approach to LCA is needed to assess the ecological and environmental consequences of the use phase of the buildings. Namely, the
values can differ signicantly among different studies.
The use of different input data, functional units, allocation methods, reference systems and other assumptions, complicates comparisons of LCA green building
studies. To be sustainable in a holistic way, an integrated design process should be adopted. Each system or
discipline in a project has some effect on another system in varying degrees. Moreover, the total environmental impact could be reduced by involving each aspect of the project from the onset. The rst step is to
form an integrated, multidisciplinary design team of
owners, architects, structural engineers, civil engineers,
geotechnical engineers, landscape designers, maintenance or operations staff, general contractor and key
subcontractors, cost consultants, and end-use representatives. Green building construction must integrate
building professionals, so that they work together for
the common goal of sustainability. This integration
must begin at the pre-design phase and continue
through to post-occupancy, in order to optimize the
building performance. Integrated design is a critical
component in reducing costs in the construction of
green buildings.
4.1 Wood as a building material
4.1. Drvo kao graevni materijal

Wood is a material of choice in many countries

for residential and light commercial buildings. 90 % of
the residential buildings in the US are wood-frame
construction. Japan is also not far behind. The use of
wood in green buildings ts well with the previously
mentioned criteria for green building materials. Wood
is a renewable resource, manufactured in nature using
a large quantity of solar energy. Hence, no fossil fuels
are required for manufacturing of wood. When waste
wood is burned, it provides an independent source of
energy. Energy from waste wood is solar energy, which
has been stored in the wood for a few years. As a result,
the embodied energy of wood is miniscule as compared
to other building materials. Wood can be recycled, but
not in the extensive manner of materials like metals
and glass. The production of wood is generally nonpolluting at all stages although there have been instances in the past with polluted sites from chemical preservative processes (Buchanan, 2006, 2010). Another
reason for building in wood is the increase in the pool
of carbon stored in wood and wood products. This is
very important from a climate change standpoint.
Green building programs do not give proper credit to
wood and its low embodied energy (Bowyer, 2008). As
a result wood products are often overlooked by architects, builders, and contractors. Within the green building sector, the wood industry must innovate and try to

DRVNA INDUSTRIJA 64 (1) 45-53 (2013)

improve their market by creating a niche for new structural products.

5 CONCLUSION
5. ZAKLJUAK
Sustainability is increasingly becoming a key
consideration of building practitioners, policy makers,
and industry alike, since the world is moving towards
zero-energy construction. When buildings have net
zero energy consumption, the effect of embodied energy and greenhouse gas emissions become important.
A zero energy house can be built with different materials and construction methods that create different cumulative carbon footprint. Wood products can have
very low or negative carbon footprint. Therefore, the
utilization of wood, the most important renewable material, in all aspects of human existence appears to be
the most effective way to optimize the use of resources
and to reduce the environmental impact associated
with mankinds activities. Typically, the use of wood
products results in lower emissions and thus a lower
overall environmental impact. However, to achieve
sustainable development, certain criteria within a
framework of economic, environmental and social systems must be followed. Only effective use of wood
through the whole value chain from forest management
and multiple use of forest resources through new wood
and ber-based materials and processing technologies
to new end-use concepts, e.g. in the area of construction, can lead to sustainable development. Therefore,
research, development and innovation related to
green buildings should focus on LCA analysis in all
product stages, from primary processing and use to disposal, and integrate knowledge and experience from
various disciplines, engaging scientists from areas like
engineering, material science, forestry, environmental
science, architecture, marketing, and business. The activities should be oriented towards new product development from renewable materials, and utilization of
the whole wood value chain, engineering solutions,
and cradle2cradle concept.
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Corresponding address:
Research Associate ANDREJA KUTNAR
University of Primorska, Andrej Marui Institute
Muzejski trg 2, 6000 Koper, SLOVENIA
ILTRA d.o.o., Celovka cesta 268,
1000 Ljubljana,
SLOVENIA
e-mail: andreja.kutnar@upr.si

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